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Ganondorf (Clash)
Ganondorf is an unlockable playable character in Super Smash Bros. Clash. Ganondorf in Clash has recieved a lengthy list of changes, both to help make him a viable fighter and to finally fix the moveset problem he's had for years. In simple terms, he's an up-close brawler character in the vein of Abel and Thor who forces the opponent to guess between a powerful blow or a Flame Choke throw combo. He's very unpredictable, very strong and a little faster than the average hard hitter which all make him very deadly indeed. Means of Unlocking Changes from Brawl to Clash Buffs *Flame Choke now, instead of causing a knockdown, leaves the opponent in the air for a small amount of time allowing you to QUICKLY follow it up with something. *Grounded Flame Choke (ONLY grounded version) can absorb one hit of a 0.180 or lower hitstun rating attack. *The air version of Flame Choke will bounce the opponent off the ground, allowing you to quickly follow it up. *New Standard Special Move: Gerudo Earthquake, based on a move of his from Ocarina of Time. *New Up Special Move: Gerudo Thunder, a modified variation of one of his Ocarina of Time attacks. *New Neutral Attack; a quick sword slash. *Wizard's Foot now destroys 0 priority projectiles on frames 6-27. *Wizard's Foot double jump trick and spiking ability both return from Melee. *Wizard's Foot now bounces off shields like it does on walls, making it MUCH safer on block. It also has higher priority. *Also has a much better Neutral Aerial. *New Side Smash; a forward sword stab, taken from Twilight Princess. *Faster air, walk and dash speed. *Slightly higher jump, double jump and short hop. *Dash Attack can now be followed up with a sword slash by pressing Attack. *New Forward Aerial; a forward sword press that is also useful to recover. *Increased grab range. *Up Strong (Volcano Kick) is a much more unique and useful attack. *Down Aerial now hits on frame 13-18, making it slightly easier to auto cancel with. Nerfs *Side Strong can no longer semi-spike. *Back Aerial is no longer auto cancelable. *Down Aerial main hitbox now does 22%, compare 23%. *Flame Choke does 7% as opposed to 9%. *Dash attack is slightly weaker. *Up Aerial has 19 frames of recover; compare 17 from Brawl. Other *Down Aerial now has darkness properties instead of electric ones. This makes it no longer Super Effective against Squirtle, but it will not be resisted by Pikachu. *Ganondorf will be using his design from The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword, assuming said design is a new one. Otherwise, Ganondorf retains his appearance from Twilight Princess, but with a build more akin to his Ocarina of Time / Melee one. *Ganondorf now grabs with his right hand during Flame Choke. Pros & Cons Ganondorf is one of the best up close and personal characters in Clash. He has a ton of ways to get in his opponents face and stay there, as well as regret an opponent for doing as much as poking him. Quite simply put, he's arguably the best non-grappler up close character in the game and is an offensive mastermind. Ganondorf may not be quite as strong as his Brawl counterpart or Black Shadow, but one combo from this guy is like five combos from anyone else. After Luigi, in terms of damage this guy is easily the scariest combo character. His Flame Choke is an excellent command throw with excellent range and set-ups, and allows for heavy frame traps and guessing games when it's landed or about to be. Ganondorf also has an easier time getting inside than other glaciers due to his Wizard's Foot, ok-ish mobility and Gerudo Earthquake. He's great at making the opponent make wrong guesses and has a lot of good anti-air and edgeguarding options. Ganondorf doesn't have many safe attacks, though, and is ridiculously easy to combo himself. He also has some moves that are, quite simply, just not useful enough, as well as awful range on his normal grab. His recovery is still one of the worst in the game, and the ways he has of not making it awful are incredibly risky. All of his supers can have problems connecting consisently. What you get is a character with a lot of improvements over his old school counterparts. Ganondorf's combination of unpredictability, power, and punishes is what truly makes him scary. If you see a good Ganondorf player around, be prepared for the fight of your life. This guy is nasty. Pros *Incredibly high damage output and knockback *Extremely unpredictable *Flame Choke is one of the most versatile attacks in the game *Great at stopping enemy approaches with his edgeguards and anti-airs *High priority normals, especially his down air *Fares better against keep away than other slow-but-strong fighters *Awesome air game Cons *His attacks aren't hard to punish when blocked. *Heavy weight and fall speed make him easy to combo *Still has some problems approaching *Terrible recovery *Terrible grab reach; one of the worst in the game. *Some of his moves, like his throws and Down Smash, just aren't good. Moveset Ground Moves Normals *Neutral Attack: Ganondorf does an overhead slash with his sword. The slowest jab in the game at 11 frames, but also has by far the best range of any jab in the game and can also be rapid fired. This also hits in a wide arc and recovers quickly, making it a decent anti-air attack. You can also set up a tick / mix-up into Flame Choke easily due to it's slight frame advantage on block and large range. **Damage: 6% *Side Strong Attack: Ganondorf leans back and does a quick kicking attack. A quick, high priority tilt with great range still make it useful despise no longer semi-spiking. It's not very safe if it is blocked, so you can't stuff it out randomly. Works decently as an anti-approach / anti-air tool. **Damage: 13% *Up Strong Attack: Ganondorf does an axe kick with a very small wind effect. Fast, but has some lag on it. Also has decent range and a wide hitbox. This is also the only Up Strong in the game which is chargeable; if you keep holding up, it eventually becomes a weaker version of the Volcano Kick from old Smash games. The truly scary part about it? It is possible, although very difficult, to combo into the Volcano Kick from a Flame Choke: Volcano Kick charge is reached on frame 32, making it a 1-frame link. It's very, very hard, but oh so worth it. Thankfully this isn't as fatal as it would be since it's a lot weaker knockback wise. **Damage: 10% (normal), 20% with 1% chip (Volcano Kick) *Down Strong Attack: Ganondorf sweeps with one of his legs. Easily Ganondorf's best ground normal; it's very fast, ends quickly, has a large low hitbox that's good for shield-stabbing, does good damage, and has priority. It's a great approach stopper and combos out of a Neutral Attack for more damage. Alongside that move, at low percents this move combos into itself as a juggle. Also has 2 IASA frames, which can use to make this safer and land a mix-up. An excellent move. **Damage: 12% (end of Ganon's leg), 10% (close) *Dash Attack: Ganondorf does a shoulder tackle. By pressing the Attack button after this, regardless of whether it hits or not, Ganondorf can follow up with a horizontal sword slash. Shoulder tackle has two hitboxes: Main hitbox deals big damage, hitting it at the tip of his shoulder (ie as anti-air) is much weaker. Comes out pretty fast and at low percents the second hitbox, second hit of this, Wizard's Foot combo is pretty good. The inital hitbox is an extremely strong attack, and the second attack is just a bit weaker. Leaves Ganondorf at heavy frame disadvantage on block, however. It's also hurt far worse by Stale Move Negotiation then most of Ganondorf's other attacks. **Damage: 16% shoulder, 10% sourspot, 8% follow-up attack Smash Attacks *Side Smash Attack: Ganondorf stabs forward quickly with his sword. This is Ganondorf's fastest Smash Attack at 14 frames; a frame faster than the Down one. The range, priority and knockback are also both pretty high. It, in exchange, has the most ending lag making it very unsafe on block. **Damage: 18% (uncharged), 25% (charged) *Up Smash Attack: Ganondorf kicks one of his legs up at an almost 90 degree angle. A great mix-up attack since it provides small (+3) frame advantage on block, recovers quickly and has a ton of IASA frames for jumps, dashes and the like. This move is also one of Ganondorf's premiere attacks in combos; his Down Aerial, Up Smash, jump cancel and Up Aerial bread 'n' butter is one of the most damaging and easiest standard combos. It's a great anti-air attack with it's cancel ability (incase it misses / is dodged) and vertical hitbox. Easily Ganondorf's most useful Smash attack. **Damage Foot: 24% (uncharged), 32% (charged) **Damage Leg: 20% (uncharged), 27% (charged) *Down Smash Attack: Ganondorf does a forward leg sweep, then brings the foe back to connect with a second one. Now combos properly all the time thanks to hitstun. You could probably use it to punish a roll or something, but aside from that, just as useless as it is in Brawl. **Damage First Kick: 5% uncharged, 7% charged **Damage Second Kick: 15% uncharged, 20% charged (20% uncharged total, 27% charged total) Aerial Moves *Neutral Aerial: Ganondorf spins his blade around twice in the air. A good shielding attack and air-to-air confrontation, due to a lengthy in range and time hitbox and very high priority. Tons of ending lag as well as landing lag but it does start up extremely fast at 5 frames. **Damage: 2% for hit; can hit up to 11 times but don't expect that to happen often *Forward Aerial: Ganondorf pulls his sword behind his back, then presses it in front of him. Slow to come out at 17 frames, but at least it has a ton of power, vertical range, and priority behind it. Has a sweetspot at the very tip of the blade, which can Meteor Smash. The rest of the hitbox makes it good for use in combos. Barely any horizontal range and high landing lag, however. **Damage: 15% *Back Aerial: Ganondorf does a quick backfist. Whiffs against several standing characters due to the weird hitbox sadly, but it is a pretty safe attack on block. Still, it's good to set other attacks up, is good for air-to-air and comes out and ends quickly. **Damage: 16% *Up Aerial: One of Ganondorf's two most important aerials, this has him do a circle kick. An extremely fast (by any standard, let alone Ganondorf's. This is his fastest attack actually) aerial with awesome offensive pressure applications. It's a great anti-air, edgeguarding attack, mix-up move, has a large hitbox (some small characters can crouch under it though), and is initially quite powerful. The last few active frames semi-spike, which allow for excellent recovery gimping as well as setting up for a reset when used in a combo (see Advanced Techniques section). There is a valid argument for this being Ganondorf's best attack. **Damage: 13%, 6% late *Down Aerial: Ganondorf's dreaded Thunder Stomp is back for the new Clash. It's a bit faster, although very slightly less damaging, then it used to be. Combined with Ganondorf's slightly higher short hop, it is MUCH easier to perform extremely damaging auto-cancel combos with this attack. This beats many, many attacks and makes characters very scared of approaching Ganondorf. It's also fast, is safe on block if it is auto-canceled (if not is ridiculously unsafe though), kills as low at 88% against grounded opponents and is a ludicrously strong Meteor Smash: Several characters can be Meteor'd at 0% with this. Quite a scary move if you know how to use it right. **Damage: 23% leg, 17% chest Grabs and Throws *Grab: Quick little swipe. Terrible range on it still, but you may be able to find ways to tick into it. Very fast on start-up and recovery though. *Pummel: Quick knee to the gut. Speed on it is ok. **Damage: 2% *Forward Throw: Ganondorf punches the foe in the gut, bouncing them forward. High damage and works to start Ganon's edgeguarding game. **Damage: 13% *Back Throw: Ganondorf kicks the opponent backward. Can kill at very high percents, but that's about it. Fthrow is better. **Damage: 10% *Up Throw: Ganondorf launches the foe into the air. This is not a Launcher. Not very useful, except for getting the other fighter airborne at least. **Damage: 7% *Down Throw: Ganondorf's only really useful throw when mid-screen has him slam the opponent into the floor. This is another key move in Ganondorf's high percent mix-up game and a couple low percent combos. At any percent it puts the foe at a huge disadvantage due to the amount of mix-ups you have after landing it. **Damage: 7% *Air Throw: Ganondorf picks the foe over his shoulder and picks them up. Awful range like the ground grab but decent knockback. **Damage: 11% Special and Super Moves Standard Special Move: Gerudo Earthquake Ganondorf quickly punches the ground and causes an earthquake that covers a little bit in front of him and a bit behind him. The earthquake also creates a small quake that travels a short distance which nullify 0 priority projectiles. You can also charge this attack by holding Special for up to 60 frames to make it stronger, create more quakes, and make said quakes stronger and travel a longer distance. This attack starts up quite quickly, at 10 frames (stays active for frames 10-13), and has a very low hitbox that is useful to stab through shields. It's also fairly strong, although not as strong as Ganon's other moves. The vertical hitbox of the initial punch quake is very, very high, making it useful as an anti-air attack. This does, however, have a lot of ending lag at 40 frames and is not safe on block at all due to the low blockstun. The punch hitbox also has low, set knockback and minimum charge, although it becomes much stronger if you charged it. On hit only, this attack can be canceled into a jump on frames 14-18, which means you can combo after this easily without any meter. This, quite simply, is an amazing feature if you catch an airborne foe with it. The horizontal range of the punch isn't much, but the quakes created cover the range problem and effectively function as projectiles. These gain priority and the punch fires out more than one if charged up to full, letting you win quite a few fireball wars with this actually. When used in the air, Ganondorf has to fall to the ground before reaching the ground, meaning it obviously has more start-up. If used as an instant air attack, even, it still starts up slower than the ground version. (if right above the ground, it has 16 frames of start-up, compare 10 for ground version) It comes to no surprise that you should mostly be sticking to the ground version, which does everything the air version does except faster. The initial ground punch hitbox does 14-26%. The quakes do 5-11%. Smash Special Version: The air version of this is much faster than the normal version when it comes to falling; an instant-air SS-Gerudo Earthquake is actually a couple frames faster than the already-fast grounded version. Start-up on grounded version is 8 frames, power and damage are about the same as the normal version but this version is completely invincible during start-up. Recovery is slightly better; against some characters you might not even need to Clash Cancel it to make it safe. Probably the best use for it is as a reversal or a move otherwise used to get someone off of you. This is also chargable like the normal version. When fully charged, this opponent has very heavy hitlag allowing you to attach various attacks on to it (one being an Up Smash!) before the opponent goes flying. Side Special Move: Flame Choke Possibly Ganondorf's best, and most important, attack. He rushes forward with his hand engraved in darkness, and if he meets with anyone in the process he grabs them by their neck and chokes them with a dark pulse. After it's done, he releases the opponent and Ganondorf has 33 frames to do whatever he wants with them. After 33 frames the foe is in a knockdown state allowing you to tech chase them, Brawl version style. There are several reasons why this move is amazing. The most obvious one is probably the fact it's an untechable command throw that has a lot of range in exchange for some start-up. Canceling random blocked attacks, such as a Down Strong or a jab into this can really mess up unsuspecting players for some free damage. You can even use this attack in the air to grab players in the middle of anti-air attacks thanks to the priority, but be aware of invincibility frame attacks like Ryu's Shoryuken and Dark Samus's Phazon Warp. The air version is also a bit stronger than the grounded one, in exchange for slower start-up and... (see below) It also has some super armor, being able to absorb one hit of any attack that has a hitstun rating below 0.180: Almost every tilt and aerial in the game can be absorbed. This also makes great to grab characters through projectiles when you're up close. Also note that the air version does NOT have this property. This move is truly an amazing tool up close and is what makes Ganondorf such a monster when he's inside. Thankfully, it is much easier to get inside with Ganondorf compared to his Brawl version, so you'll have more opportunities to strike fear into the opponent's heart with it. It's also very useful in combos because he can create some nasty frame traps and possible resets with this attack. This is a really, really good feature for Ganondorf due to the new damage scaling system which makes combos much less damaging. Even if you fail the reset, you still have a major advantage over your opponent for landing mix-ups. For information on how to perform this, see the Flame Choke resets section in Advanced Techniques. Like in Brawl, you can use the move to commit suicide and take another fighter with you. It will always kill Ganondorf off first if you do it against someone large, though, so don't rely on getting into Sudden Death with it. This attack does 7% on the ground and 12% in the air. Smash Special Version: The air version of this gets the air version the normal version has. Both have damage boosts by 5% and travel a little farther in terms of distance. Not the best use of meter unless you absolutely need that extra damage and distance to go through a move or get the damage for the next move to land the KO. Up Special Move: Gerudo Thunder Ganondorf creates a sphere of electricity and throws it in a direction the player can choose in the opening frames, then chases up to the ball and does one of two things depending on whether or not the foe was hit by the ball or not. If the ball was left alone, Ganondorf absorbs the balls energy and shoots said energy downward, which has him hop a bit into the initial direction you threw the sphere. After this he enters helpless state. If you do try to do this offensively, there aren't many situations where an air Wizard's Foot wouldn't work better, so I'd avoid it. If someone made contact with the ball, Ganondorf instead grabs them and shocks them several times for letting go for good knockback and damage. This is a bit similar to Ganondorf's old Up B, the Dark Dive, and does not leave Ganondorf in helpless state. This isn't as bad of a recovery move as Dark Dive, but it's not anything special. It's not very useful offensively for the most part, considering the ball is blockable and if defended as such, gets you a very unsafe follow-up attack. Outside of recovering of course, it's not a very useful attack. The initial ball does no damage. The shot of electric energy (done if ball whiffs) does 9 hits for 2% each. The electric grab does 15%. Smash Special Version: This is much faster than the normal version and is a difficult move to gimp, but otherwise has identical properties. Use if you need to outspeed your opponent's edgeguarding attack. Down Special Move: Wizard's Foot Ganondorf kicks forward with his foot encased in darkness. This has two variations; the ground version travels straight forward and the air version travels at a steep angle downward. This move isn't Ganondorf's most important attack, but there are some key uses to this move. One is the fact it's one of Ganondorf's main approaching options against heavily defensive characters that generally make the Dorf's life hell, such as Funky Kong and Ike as not only does it have decent priority, some of the move's animation can be used to barrage through weaker projectiles without any harm. Against characters without chargeable projectiles, this is really effective and forces characters to mix up their defensive game. It also works in general for mobility considering Ganondorf, while being faster than he was in the last game, is still very slow. The hitbox also lasts an extremely long time making it good to punish sidestep dodges. The aerial version has thre hitboxes: The initial attack is a very powerful spike that has higher priority than it's grounded counterpart. The other hitbox, which occurs a bit later, has massive vertical knockback and is useful in air-to-air encounters. The last version, which is the hitbox upon hitting the ground, causes a small earthquake useful for hitting unsuspecting players who drop a shield quickly. This also gives Ganondorf back his double jump. Given how terrible said double jump is, though, I would still avoid using this in recovery. You can also do an instant version of the air Wizard's Foot known as Quake, but there doesn't appear to be much use for it if any. Both versions of this attack are some of the most unsafe attacks in the game when blocked, so you cannot afford using either of them randomly even with the new bounce feature, since Ganondorf doesn't fall as fast as Falcon does after this is blocked. The last couple frames of both versions can be canceled into non-Clash Attack / Clash Cancel options, but it takes some time to get the timing down. You can also use the move to perform an extremely difficult, but very useful, advanced technique / glitch called the Flight of Ganon, which works like it does in Brawl basically. The ground version does 13% up close and 11% otherwise. The first hitbox for the air version does 16%, second air version 15% and the "quake" does 8%. Smash Special Version: 'This version of the attack isn't too different from the original. Every version of it does 2% extra damage, a little more knockback, and the projectile nullification abilities are a bit different. The air version has much less landing lag and is difficult to punish if you touch, say, the opponent's feet with it. I wouldn't use the SS ground version, but the air one may come in handy. Clash Attack 1: Gerudo Blow (Ground) *Consumes 2 levels of Ganondorf's Clash Attack Meter. *Done with Down, Down Forward, Forward + Special + Attack on the ground. Ganondorf rushes about 1/7 Final Destination with a gutter punch. If it connects, Ganondorf follows it up with 3 more punches ending in an sword slam which will bounce the opponent off the ground for very high knockback. The initial punch, in exchange for starting slowly (20 frames) has invincibility frames on frames 1-18; they do not last until the attack starts but it is good to go through short, high recovery attacks. You can combo into this from a Down Aerial against fast falling middle/heavyweights, and it does great knockback (KOs at about 65%). This attack does 5 hits for 33%. Clash Attack 2: Gerudo Blow (Air) *Consumes 2 levels of Ganondorf's Clash Attack Meter. *Done with Down, Down Forward, Forward + Special + Attack in the air While the Gerudo Blows share a name, it functions wildly different when use on the ground or in the air. This version has him do a slightly slower version of his Up Aerial, then follow it up with 3 kicks ending in a Meteor Smashing sword slash. Leaves Ganondorf in helpless state. It doesn't have the range or invincibility of the ground version but it is a lot easier to combo into from a super canceled Neutral or Up Aerial. The Meteor Smash property also makes it useful as an edgeguard. This attack does 5 hits for 30%. Final Smash 1: Beast Blow *Requires at least half his Super Smash Meter to be filled. *Done with Forward, Down, Down Forward + Special + Attack. You've got to have the token Beast Ganon transformation. Ganondorf quickly tranforms into his Twilight Princess beast self, stomps on the ground (anyone near his feet will then be put in a buried state). After a bit, he rushes forward, attacking anyone in his path. This move is ridiculously hard to combo into unless you land the bury hit, in which case it is much easier. It travels full screen and destroys all projectiles (super or otherwise!) however, so you may be able to find a use for it as a full-screen projectile punish. It doesn't punish beams though. It's also extremely powerful and pretty safe on block depending on the distance you did it from. The bury hit does 10%. The rush does 80-112%, depending on how much the Super Smash Meter was filled. Final Smash 2: Triforce of Power *Requires at least half his Super Smash Meter to be filled. *Done with Down, Down Back, Back + Special + Attack. Ganondorf holds his right hand up with his sword in it, then laughs. If anyone attacks him in any way during this, he'll attack with a barrage of sword slashes ending in the foe getting a taste of the Triforce of Power. This will counter ''everything that isn't a throw, from projectiles, beam Final Smashes, physical Final Smash, traps, and really, everything for enormous damage and knockback. This will counter the opponent from anywhere on screen, even if they are a full screen away. If this move is used properly, Ganondorf becomes a defensive mastermind when he has Super Smash Meter. However, attacks with invincibility can overcome this if performed properly. This attack does 96-135%, depending on how much the Super Smash Meter was charged. Other Taunts and Victory Poses On-screen appearance In The Dark Tournament: Adventure Mode Competitive Tactics and Advice Match-ups Advanced techniques Uair into Flame Choke reset / mix-up One of the reasons Ganondorf is so much more viable in Super Smash Bros. Clash is for being basically the only character at this writing capable of frequently resetting the damage scaling system implemented in Clash. This allows him to create some extremely powerful combos. This is very difficult to do, however, and only works against 0.034 or lower armor characters. (only Bowser, R.O.B., other Ganons, Samus, Black Shadow and King K. Rool cannot be reset) Any combo that ends in a weak (frames 14-16 hit) Up Aerial can usually be followed up with a Flame Choke frame trap / reset. The move leaves you at heavy frame advantage (+16). While STILL IN THE AIR, you need to wait for the weak Up Aerial to end and then start a Flame Choke the very moment the animation ends. Air Flame Choke has 19 frames start-up, meaning if it does hit it will not be treated as part of the combo. However, there's... another thing. All air dodges in Clash become invincible starting on frame 3. If timed properly, the opponent only has '''one frame to start the air dodge fast enough and become invincible before the Flame Choke comes through; unlike most throws in the game Flame Choke cannot grab air dodging opponents. They only get that one frame if, of course, you get your Flame Choke started properly, which is easier said than done. Alongside the reset, you can also just let them air dodge and mix-up your foe with an air throw or setting up offense on the ground, with something like a Volcano Kick or an Up Smash. This is an extremely effective tactic and one all Ganondorf players should work to master. 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